Pearl Buck’s “The Good Earth” is the story of a simple farming family set in the early 20th century in rural China. Wang Lung is an ambitious young man who seems to be in complete control of his destiny. But as a young farmer, he abruptly discovers that the one thing he doesn’t have under control is the all-important rainfall that every farmer depends on and fears. The entire existence of this farmer is controlled by the rain that has the ability to provide him with times of feast, famine and flood. As Wang ages, he tries to adjust to the abysmal weather that rain or lack of rain can give him, but these conditions turn out to be defining events in Wang’s life.
Wang and his purchased wife O-lan, a former slave, tirelessly work the land with the help of a generous and constant summer rainy season. Wang and O-lan are grateful that the fields and crops are irrigated without having to do the back-breaking work of carrying buckets of water slung from a pole on their shoulders. The irrigation of their fields provides a kind of small feast for the few farmers. The small plot of land Wang owns produces onions, garlic, rice, beans, corn, cereals and wheat, the fruit of the land. This little party also helps support the farm animals. The ox that plows the fields is well fed and watered and the small collection of chickens and pigs are kept and then consumed. Furthermore, it can be reasonably argued that Wang’s children are well nourished during infancy with the healthy mother’s milk provided by O-lan.
At harvest, Wang is wise to sell most of his crops on the market while retaining only enough food supplies for family consumption during China’s long, cold winters. Unlike Wang’s scheming uncle, also a farmer but much less successful, Wang hangs food from the rafters of his house for the winter. In the market, Wang, despite his illiteracy, is astute in knowing how to sell his crops when prices are high while he stores crops that are sold at low prices for future times when prices are favorable. Much to Wang’s delight, his business savvy provides him with the precious silver coins with which he eagerly lines his belt. Any additional silver is secretly hidden in the walls of his dwelling for future use. Wang has great respect and understanding for his hard-earned silver because it not only represents security for him, his father and his family, but it is also being saved to purchase more prized farmland. Upon purchasing rice land from the House of Hwang, he shouts, “To the big house it means nothing, this handful of land, but to me it means how much!” All this is provided by the rain to Wang and his family.
But one can reasonably say that for what the rain gives, the rain can also take away. It is not hard for the reader to see that all is going too well for the humble peasant family. Can scarcity times be brought forward? Can the fertile land of Wang fail them? Because the earth can only produce what the rain provides. The rains that should have come in early summer stopped, and day after day the skies shone with a cool, careless brilliance. As the skies dry up and the clouds grow incapable, Wang faces a devastating drought that nearly destroys him, his family, and his fellow villagers. The lack of rain leaves Wang’s fields dry, cracked and fruitless. He has nothing to sell in the market and almost nothing to feed his family. Animals starve or are poached for food. The villagers are left numb with hunger and idle as scattered leaves. Children are particularly affected as their bodies resemble bony skeletons, except for their familiar swollen bellies. The desperation begins when people are forced to eat grass, tree bark, and even dirt. Worse still, Wang’s neighbor Ching informs him of the horror: “In the village they are eating human flesh.”
The prolonged and unrelenting drought turns the villagers into evil, rabid dogs who, mafia-style, resort to stealing from each other, including the last bits of dried beans and corn from Wang. This is a terrible event for Wang because he doesn’t he has food for O-lan, who is pregnant with her fourth child and her breasts are now barren and she cannot feed her baby. The girl once cried from hunger but remained silent. She was never the same as a result of hunger. O-lan’s strength in giving birth to her fourth child is a testament to her inner strength. What an agony of hunger this woman had endured, with the hungry creature biting her from within, desperate for her very life! How difficult must it have been for O-lan to mercifully squeeze the life out of the weak and malnourished newborn? In better times it would have been a sin to take the baby’s life, but in such desperate and supernatural times it was probably for the best. The child, being born a woman, facilitated the morbid decision of the young mother. O-lan proves to be the rock and foundation of the family and her strength and her devotion to her family go unnoticed until the moment of her death.
Years later, after the rains revisit Wang’s lands and civilized life returns to the village, Wang is faced with another natural event that affects the average and routine life of this common farmer. Excessive rainfall fills the river to the north and runoff from winter snows causes the mighty river to overflow its banks. A great sea now engulfs Wang’s fields. All forms of planting, cultivating, and harvesting cease and no work can be done. Fortunately, Wang was prepared for hard times, as he wisely stockpiled food rations and is owed sums of money from the grain markets. But now Wang faces a different kind of difficulty that changes his life in unexpected ways. The lack of work in the fields leaves Wang idle and not knowing what to do with his time. To entertain himself, Wang drinks tea at the town’s tea house. There he watches in horror as men play and mingle with evil women. But Wang is influenced and cannot resist the temptation of a beautiful young woman. She was one of the most beautiful, a slender little thing, a light body like a bamboo and a pointed little face like a kitten’s face. Wang’s wealth allows him to afford to buy the young woman as his mistress, and when the flood waters recede, O-lan finds herself sharing his home with a new addition to the family. Of course, O-lan was hurt by the sudden and unexpected change in her husband’s behavior, but she accepted it and continued to serve Wang as the slave she once was.
In Wang’s old age, he does not remember all that the rain bestowed on his life. Instead, she looks back at the vast fields that she acquired with great satisfaction. She takes pride in her flock of children and grandchildren. As Wang looks toward his death, he takes comfort in the knowledge that he will be buried in his land along with the rest of his deceased family members.